Home networks have become used on an increasingly greater scale. The user of a home network controls a remote server from a client device via the network using, e.g., an input device such as a TV remote control device. Other client devices such as DVD players, personal video controllers, etc. typically are also part of the network, and the server thus affords central control of all devices by means of a simple remote control device.
As understood herein, the graphic user interface (GUI) that the server presents on, e.g., a client TV for the user to employ in entering commands is not easily, and remotely, used. More specifically, the GUI ordinarily displays still text data such as menu, exit, back, etc., but is displayed using less than optimum video encoding, i.e., the video encoding that is used to optimize motion picture quality. As understood by the present invention, this video encoding rate is inefficient in terms of still picture with text data, resulting in GUI text data often being shown unclearly.
As also recognized herein, the response of many server-based home network systems to remote commands is slow, sometimes in excess of a second. This is because remote commands are forced into time slots that may be occupied by other data, e.g., audio/video data, and hence the transmission of a command from a client device to the server can be delayed by a noticeable and inconvenient period while transmission of the non-command data is effected.